Not a 77 Things That Don’t Completely Suck sort of day.

Just a thanking day.

Thank you to Mr. Pants for saying everything that’s in my head.

But that I don’t have the balls to say.

Also for coming up with the word blauthenticity. And for going by the name Sparky Firepants. Because he can.

And for titling a blog post this post has no SEO blah.

Small business, blah blah.
Design, blah. Blah blah. Design good. blah.
Logos and branding blah. Do this. Blah blah. Think about your people… blah.
SXSW. Blahgity blah blah. Not going…because x, y, z, blah.
Who’s doing what blah. Products. blah. Teleclass, blah.
Think different, blah. blauthenticity.

I adore you, Mr. Pants. And I haven’t had a beer with you in at least a couple of months, so head on over to my part of town, please.

Thank you Patty for being inspirational, fabulous and wearing pajamas.

Three whole days at a business conference in her pajamas.

“Who is this inappropriately dressed intruder who dares sully our convention?”

I have met Patty and yes, she is always wearing pajamas and yes, she is that cool but still. A speakers conference.

Let us salute Patty.

Thank you xkcd for making me laugh — out loud — on the crappiest of crappy days.

Seriously. This hit me right in the funny bone. On a day when nothing was even slightly funny.

Thank you Sarah for introducing me to disapproving rabbits.

They’re rabbits. Who disapprove.

And then when people are all mean and shoe-throw-ey and disapproving? You pretend they’re rabbits, and it makes everything that much more bearable.

Thank you to my ex-husband for divorcing me eight years ago this week.

My life is ridiculously better because of that. I hope yours is too.

Thank you.

Thank you, Wednesday for not being Monday anymore. Happy Wednesday.

Jessica-Rabbit-kisses to the commenter mice and the Beloved Lurkers and you.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Item! Pumpkin Head McMuffin Muffin?
• Very Personal Ads #23: In which I say Zoooooooooooooom
• 77 Things That Don’t Completely Suck: 2009

So I taught this class last week about what to do when shoes are being thrown (when people say hurtful things).

It was a great class. And since there were way more questions than we ever could have gotten to, I want to touch on one that was asked by several people:

“My big shoe-related stuckness is being so afraid of the potential pain of them that it’s very, very hard to move forward on certain necessary projects … which is causing different kinds of stress & strain.

“What can I do when I feel stuck and freaked out in anticipation of shoes — of entering a shoe-heavy space?”

Let’s see if we can help.

Can we just start with how much it sucks to be in a situation where we know there are going to be shoes?

Ugh. Horrible.

It’s hard enough dealing with unexpected shoes, but anticipation and paralyzing fear is just not fun. I’m sorry.

I do have a few suggestions that — depending on your very specific situation — could possibly help come up with plans to deal with some of that fear.

Okay. Creating safety.

Because that’s the most important thing here.

There are all sorts of ways we can try and do this, but this has to be the focus.

Obviously there are always going to be unknown quantities. Things you can’t possibly be prepared for.

Not to mention the known quantities that you can’t do much about — like your hypercritical boss or your snippy in-laws.

While you won’t always be able to ensure a shoe-free environment, there are still things you can do to create a greater sense of safety for yourself.

Examples! Looking at a couple of different situations…

Fear of criticism — shoes from total strangers.

Say you’re starting a blog and you’re worried about people not getting it. Saying mean things.

There are a couple of practical, “in the hard” things you could do to create more of a sense of safety there.

• You can set up comments so they have to be approved.

• You could get a friend to approve them for you once a day so you don’t have to see them. Maybe you trade.

  Then after six months or so you can find out how many shoes your friend has deleted for you. My guess is going to be not that many. But hey at least you didn’t have to encounter any of them yourself.

  Safety? Now there’s more of it.

• You might also create a comment policy. Or a disclaimer-ey page. Or both. So that it’s very, very clear to potential shoe-throwers what’s cool and what’s not.

Fear of criticism — shoes from people who love you.

You want to write a book or teach a class or sell stuff on Etsy. You want to start doing your thing.

And you’re feeling anxious, anticipating the avalanche of what-ifs and “here are all the ways you might fail” from the people you want to be on your side.

Your friends. Your partner. Your family. Those people.

That’s when it becomes really important to remember that your baby idea is a tiny, sweet thing, and it’s vulnerable.

Which means two things:

1. You want to be extremely careful when you choose who gets to know about it and how much they get to know.
2. You are going to have to be very clear when you ask for support. Specifically this means saying something like this:
   

   “Honey, I’m guessing that you might have some really helpful suggestions about why this might not work, because you want to protect me. And I really appreciate that you love me and want me to be safe.

   And, at the same time, I need to ask you to not give me any constructive criticism on this at the moment, because right now I am feeling very vulnerable.

   I need to stay motivated, and what’s going to motivate me — at the moment — is reminders of how smart and tough I am.

   At a later date we can talk strategy — right now I’m really needing support and encouragement.”

Fear of criticism — shoes from people who don’t really love you.

People you work with.

People you have to interact with because of stupid, annoying circumstances — not people you would ever willingly invite to your house for dinner.

This is where things can really suck — if you’re in a situation where you just can’t avoid these people and the endless shoe-throwing drama of being around them.

This is where it helps to have a band of allies.

It might be people who carry some sort of symbolic meaning for you — like in Barbara Sher’s trippy ideal family exercise.

• It can be people you know. Yow can count me in on yours.
• Some of your allies will help you come up with smart things to say.
• Some of your allies will serve as reminders that you are loved and adored.
• Some of your allies will be there for moral support and maybe some will be kicking ass for you too.

The point is, you are not alone.

You are not alone.

Even when it really, really feels like you are. We’re all going through this. And we’re all working on our own stuff. We’re in it together.

And then?

You march in there, packing emotional protection — and then you go into scientist mode.

You remind yourself that anything they say is their stuff. That the fact that it bothers you is your stuff. And that you are just there taking notes on this situation for your own personal destuckification process.

You’re learning about your patterns. Where you get hooked. Where you get triggered. Which things you perceive as shoes, which things you don’t, and why.

And then you patch yourself up and drink tea and look at your notes. And make preparations for next time.

And maybe the time after that. For the time — eventually — when none of this will touch you because you will be in sovereignty, which is the state (and spiritual quality) of not giving a damn about stupid shit that other people might say.

Whooo!

I could have ended this post right there, but I have another magic trick thingy that’s so useful that I just have to share.

The invisible mentor.

Everyone needs an invisible mentor. They’re like aikido for shoe-blocking.

It goes like this.

Concerned Annoyed Pushy Person In Your Life: “Oh is that what you’re interested in now? It’s so hard to know what with you changing your mind every two minutes. When are you going to settle down and do something sensible?”
You: “Actually, my artistic mentor is extremely excited about this new direction. We’re not discussing it with outside people while it’s in planning mode, though. I’ll update you on it when it’s something I can talk about.”

Concerned Annoyed Pushy Person In Your Life: “Oh come on, you’re never going to make any money coaching people. How much did you make last year? What are the numbers?”
You: “Well, you know, my business mentor is very firm about me not discussing the numbers with anyone until we hit the target we’re working towards.”

See how that works?

The important thing.

The concerned, annoyed, pushy people in your life are related to your monsters — they mean well, they’re looking out for you, and, at the same time, you’re still hurting from it.

And your invisible mentor is like your Negotiator — the one who can be calm and collected and knows what to say, even when you’re all torn apart.

If you don’t have one, you can go ahead and pretend that I’m yours. Or Selma, if you prefer. I’m sure she’d be great at it.

Comment zen.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. It’s a process. We’re in it together, so we don’t give advice but we do empathize and pass the snacks around. Mmmmm. Snacks.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Ask Havi #25: Destuckifying a hurt.
• Shoes. Everywhere.
• Explosions.

So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.

And now it’s my weekly ritual. Yay, ritual!

A love letter this time.

Because The Fluent Self is celebrating a birthday today. And it feels like kind of a big deal. So I’m writing it a letter.

My dear sweet love,

It is five years today since I knew you existed. A few months later when you first got your real name.

And four years today since we marched into City Hall in San Francisco and made it official.

I felt as though I was holding you in the palm of my hand, trying to grasp how something so fragile and so special could breathe and exist in this world.

Like if someone breathed too hard, you would be gone. Whoosh. A dandelion in a gust of wind.

But I was wrong.

You may have been a tiny, sweet thing, but you were also a force to be reckoned with. So much power. So full of surprises. The best possible birthday present to me. Every single year.

And look at you now.

Your success provides me and Selma and my gentleman friend with a beautiful, safe place to live and everything we need. With a kooky, bizarre, fun, meaningful life.

With this space. This gathering of bright, interesting, silly people who are my people. My right people.

And you care for me as much as I care about you.

And you are pure possibility.

Oh yes. You are my pirate ship and I am your pirate queen. We can go anywhere together, because you are the fastest and — when I am with you — I become the smartest and the silliest and I can imagine anything.

Who would have thought? Not me.

Remember?

Ohmygod.

I knew nothing about business. Nothing.

But you needed to live. And thrive. And do crazy, wonderful things in the world.

Also, I really needed to not live on the street.

And so I learned. We didn’t have any money so I threw myself into reading everything I could get my hands on.

Remember? How many ezine-thingies and online newsletters we devoured? How many stacks of business books from the library?

The classes at the Small Business Association. The freebie teleclasses from various biggifiers. The binders of notes and piles of scribbled ideas.

It was two years before we actually bought anything. A class with Andy. It was awesome. I was too scared to speak during the calls but I took notes on how one day I would teach mine.

I remember.

I remember when I was too embarrassed to hand out business cards without adding oh I’m such a corporate whore sell-out sorry that I have a business card I know it’s gross I’m sorry.

I remember when we’d get six people on a teleclass instead of six hundred.

And when it was terrifying instead of fun.

I remember doing things the hard way. I remember staying up too late and getting up too early.

Forgetting to take care of myself. Forgetting to live by what I wanted to teach.

And of course there were shoes thrown at us. Each time the period of paralyzing fear and agonizing doubt that followed got shorter…

But it took a hell of a long time to even notice that.

We’ve been through a lot of scary together.

Like when we produced the Procrastination Dissolve-o-Matic. It took months. Just the hugest, craziest most intimidating project.

And I was so afraid we’d never finish and I’d have to die of shame. Or possibly of boredom from everyone I met making “oh, are you procrastinating on your procrastination book” jokes.

Then it was done and only a couple of people bought it even though it was on sale for practically nothing (in retrospect possibly because it was on sale for practically nothing).

And my monsters were horrible and bitchy about it:

What’s the point why do you even bother doing anything since no one appreciates it anyway and it probably isn’t even any good and you’re wasting your goddamn liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiife.

Except that then the people who had it were getting these amazing results. And changing their lives in cool and completely surprising ways.

It’s now our most popular product by a lot (even though my own personal favorite is still the Emergency Calming Techniques package). So. Just goes to show ya.

Yeah. I know. It was me who was worried. You, my sweet business, you were fine. You were always fine. I’m the one who concocted all the drama. You just did what needed to be done.

Regrets? Sure.

I’ve made some decisions that weren’t the wisest.

I haven’t always been spending as much time on the bridge as I would have liked.

There have been times when I relinquished my sovereignty and let other people or situations run things.

I have cried myself to sleep. I have overworked us into Emergency Vacations. I have screwed up with people and with things and with commitments. I have lost friends.

And we’ve learned.

Thanks to you, I know how to write a terrific apology letter. Goodness knows I’ve had enough opportunities to practice that one.

We’ve been on German television. In the New York Freaking Times. Done Shiva Nata in unlikely and inappropriate places.

And get this — I can now write a killer sales page in under fifteen minutes. Except that I still can’t say “sales page” without having to throw up a little.

So I call them hats. Yes, hats. It stands for Havi’s Announcing a Thing. HAT. But you love me for that so it totally works.

Thank you, my dear.

You. The Fluent Self.

So much more of a bad-ass than I give you credit for. And so much fun.

You can stand up for yourself now. You can talk to me and show me where you want to go. We can have madcap adventures together. Whee!

Here’s to the next five years, honey.

My commitment.

To love you.

To appreciate you.

To take care of myself so we can love each other up for many more years to come.

Thank you for changing every single thing in my life.

And thanks to all of my commenter mice and the Beloved Lurkers and everyone out there who is a part of my business in some way. I love you all too.

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.

I wanted big forward progress on my Playground project. And got it. Though a lot of it happened in my head rather than on the ground. But that counts too. Good stuff.

And I asked for lots of questions for my teleclass on shoe-throwing. Which I got. In spades. Thanks, guys!

The last thing was about transition rituals for birthdays and such. Got a ton of excellent suggestions. And have been coming up with some of my own. So we’re good. Yay.

Comments. Since I’m already asking …

I am adding to my practice of asking for stuff by being more specific about what I would like to receive in the comments.

Here’s what I want (just leave them in the comments):

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!
• If you live in Portland and you think you might have met my Playground space, please let me know!
• Celebrating with me for this wonderful thing that I want!

What I would rather not have:

• Advices.

Thanks for doing this with me!

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Item! Many exclamation points!
• Insert non-sexual vibration joke here
• Shot by Men With Pens (Take 3)

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

Seriously? Friday?

I’m a little confused as to how that happened when it was just Friday a couple days ago.

Huh.

The hard stuff

The busy and the tired and the busy-tired.

So it was Dana’s 50th birthday bash all last weekend.

Which was awesome because we love her. And because practically all our friends were in town.

And it also meant staying up waaaaaaaaay past my bedtime three nights in a row.

Oh, and drinking. And eating burritos. Yes, plural. Not all at once though. And generally wreaking havoc on all possible rituals and routines.

Don’t get me wrong. It was fabulous. And having houseguests was considerably more fun than I’d imagined.

It was just a lot. And my recovery time isn’t what it used to be.

Bleargh.

Tired body. Tired brain.

Not getting to work on my stuff.

This week was so … full.

I taught a bunch of classes. Had a ton of client sessions. And it was all marvelous.

Except that none of the things I wanted to work on got any attention.

Trapped under piles!

I went all Metaphor Mouse on the filing thing and am pretending that it’s pirate treasure mapping.

But I still kind of hate it.

The good stuff

Dana’s birthday weekend.

Seeing lots of friends!

Being incredibly silly.

Running around Portland drinking and carousing and wearing pirate drag!

It was pretty great. And we had friends staying with us. And lots of good food.

And yay. I am most definitely not a party person. But I enjoyed the hell out of the weekend all the same.

Purim!

I was a pirate queen. Which is kind of stupid because I am a pirate queen all the time, anyway.

And Selma (my duck) dressed up as a dragon-monster. And Diki (my dragon-monster) went as a duck.

Good times.

Lots of presents!

Costumes for Selma and my monster from Elizabeth the Bee. A beautiful print from Diane. Something mysterious from my favorite uncle.

Love and wonder and fabulousness.

Lots of stuff happening.

We had several hundred people on the Habits Detective call. And I taught a Shiva Nata class to the Roller Derby team that I sponsor (Guns N Rollers)!

It’s pretty much all fun.

More Roller-Derby-related happinesses.

So Portland’s all-star team Wheels of Justice killed at the Wild West Showdown.

And yeah, these are actual ranked bouts that mean stuff, as opposed to just messing around.

Our girls beat Philly (ranked #6). And we were this close to beating Oly (ranked #1 — and frankly I’d pretty much only been hoping we wouldn’t lose by 200 points or break anyone, so that was incredible too).

And then destroyed the B.A.D. Girls of the Bay Area 154-27.

Portland Roller Derby is kicking ass. And I’m so happy I can’t even stand it.

Non-Emergency Vacation coming up in 3, 2, 1…

The absolute highlights of last year were my two Emergency Vacations. I mean, not the circumstances that resulted in their existence.

But the taking-off-of-time and, you know, not working.

And this year? I’m planning actual time off. I know. Hard to believe.

Strategic mouse! So mid-March I will be gone. And that is very exciting.

And now it’s my weekend.

Which means I get to do lots of nothing while celebrating the anniversary of my business and also of being born.

The plan: go for a ridiculously frou-frou body treatment (something with mud?) and have my gentleman friend make delicious foods (foods!).

And hide. Yay.

Hiding.

And … playing live at the meme beach house!

Yes, that’s a Stuism too.

My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”

This week?

Balkan Hangover.

Seriously. It’s just one guy.

That’s it for me …

And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.

Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?

And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Monster-Watching: Some notes.
• Friday Chicken #82: harvest gold edition
• Friday Chicken #80: Recovering from the February Cranky

So apparently my decision-making methodology has changed completely over the course of a year without me noticing.

All of my criteria are different. The process. The approach. All different.

Weird.

The decision at play: whether or not to go to SXSW.* I totally regretted not going in 2008, and then Selma and I went last year and had a blast.

* South by Southwest, the big interactive conference thingy in Austin where all the blog-ey people and pretty much all my friends and colleagues will be.

What I’ve used to base decisions on in the past.

“Is it good for my business?”

And yeah, going to SXSW last year was great for my business.

The connections I made (and the actual business that resulted from them) more than paid for the price of admission, the plane tickets and the cost of being there.

From a biggification standpoint, it was completely the right thing to do.

Except that I’ve kind of stopped making that my focus.

The question has now been replaced with this:

“Is it good for me?“

Because not everything that is good for my business is good for me.

But (so far, at least) everything that is good for me does good things for my business.

On the other hand, good for me? Not enough of a reason all by itself.

There are lots of things that might be good for me. So how do I know what’s important?

Here’s what I base decisions on now:

Capacity.

This turned out to be my big word last year.

Also my biggest learning curve. And my ow everything hurts.

So we know considerably more now about how much time/space/energy I need to function in the world.

The question last year was “What do I have capacity for? Can I squeeze something else in there?” …

This year it has evolved: “How can I get better at respecting my capacity so that I’m not constantly pushing at the edges?”

Capacity.

Just because I can hold my breath for a long time doesn’t mean that’s what I want to be doing right now. Or every day.

I don’t want to be at capacity. I want space and spaciousness.

Want vs. Should.

The want part is easy.

Obviously I want to spend time with my friends.

Obviously I want to see people I never get to see.

The question is just whether or not this is how I want to see them.

And the should? Oh, there are so many.

Everyone’s going. Blah blah blah. How can you not? Blah blah blah. People will think blah blah blah. And they’ll start to say blah blah blah. And then you’re screwed because blah blah blah.

That’s the monsters talking. I can have a conversation with them. What I’ve learned in the meantime is that the shoulds are louder than the wants.

The life of an HSP (highly sensitive person).

Severe introvert alert!

Now combine that with extreme sensitivity to all sorts of things that don’t seem to bother most of the people I know. Can’t do crowds. Can’t do noise.

Oh, and I’m allergic to conference centers.

So obviously I could do what I did last year, and just not go to any of the actual events. Just hang out with the people I want to see. In increasingly smaller doses.

It’s just that even that was incredibly exhausting and overwhelming. And the recovery was hell.

Recovery time.

Calculating recovery time has become a big thing.

Even for stuff I really, really want to do.

Last year I needed about a week before I was able to come back to myself.

Worth it?

What is the real draw here?

Fun! Fun! Fun! Which is definitely a legitimate thing to care about.

Sharing a house last year with Pam and Naomi and Nathan was outrageously fun.

Just spending more time with Jeff would be reason enough to go again.

Except that it would be way more fun to fly to Arizona and visit him without all the craziness and the stress and the running around.

So what is fun for me?

Being with people I adore. Laughing. Coming up with crazy biggification ideas.

How am I going to get more of that?

The no-brainer solution.

This is Victoria’s thing. What would make this decision a no-brainer?

Well, if I went to SXSW, I’d need a week of scheduled Emergency Vacation afterwards. And I’d need to find a way to avoid all parties or really, groups of more than five or six people.

Or I could not go and have a week of scheduled NON-Emergency Vacation instead. Otherwise known as Strategic Pirate-ey Biggification Time!

And skip the recovery period because it will be its own recovery period.

And make plans to visit friends some other time.

The internal solution.

I’ve been taking Hiro’s excellent Become Your Own Business Advisor course, and one of the things we’ve been learning to do is to work with symbols that represent what we’re working on.

And when I look at a symbol of SXSW and a symbol of me, I can’t get them to cozy up to each other.

Even when my brain has good arguments for why this would be a really good thing.

And even when I can get on board in every other way. My internal direction is still insisting that this is a big no.

So I’m not going.

I’m figuring out what kinds of things I might have gotten out of it.

If I can get some of them in other, better-for-me ways, yay. And if not, oh well.

And in the meantime, Selma and I are planning our Non-Emergency Vacation. We have useful criteria. And a lot more information than we used to about what we need to stay grounded.

We’re calling it JWNS (Just West No South) and we’ll be visiting beautiful places in Oregon.

Eating cheese. Scribbling madly in notebooks. Going to bed at nine.

And making new decisions. Based on things that are still so completely weird and foreign to me.

Like respecting my capacity. And not being impressed by shoulds.

And trusting that doing stuff that’s good for me is okay.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Havi’s Insecurities: blogging live from SXSW
• Transition-ey stuff. Take 2.
• Why people don’t give you testimonials.

Actually, I’m under the strict compulsion to write ten pages about anything on my mind. So this is me. Practicing brevity.

I was going to come up with a clever title but then the posts I’m Item! -izing this week all have way better titles than anything I could come up with.

Going with my mad Shivanautical mutterings, hanging my head in shame, and then distracting you with bright and shiny links! Whee!

Item! Post No. 56 in a mostly weekly series that really wasn’t supposed to last this long.

Item! The skirt of stars.

Shannon made an “illuminated interactive” skirt.

Oh yes. And now it will drive you crazy that you don’t have one.

“… a hand-sewn tulle wrap skirt with integrated fiber optics and lights that change color in response to the speed and direction of the wearer’s movement.

It uses the Lilypad Arduino platform, developed for integrating electronics into textiles. There’s a purple organza underlayer to the skirt onto which is sewn the Lilypad main circuit board and a power supply, and an accelerometer hangs from a ribbon to allow for freedom of movement. The Lilypad receives the measurements of the accelerometer’s movement, and translates them into color output for the tricolor LEDs around the waistband of the skirt.”

AWESOME.

She’s @spiralshannon on Twitter.

Item! Salty buttery popcorn flavored epiphanies.

This post!

It’s called why I brush my teeth and other body thoughts and it’s full of great.

First she describes Dance of Shiva as “Sudoku for your body”, which is brilliant.

Then she goes all Metaphor Mouse on her life and comes up with the most astonishing things. Also her site is gorgeous.

“I want the structure without the rigidity, the immovability. I don’t want to have to wreck the building if the layout isn’t working. I wrote a bit about it but got stuck and couldn’t figure out what word I needed …

Then suddenly it totally hit me, while walking down the street. Body. “

She’s @SaltyLaura on Twitter.

Item! Whack-a-mole and the People Pleasing Autobahn.

I adore Lynn. And the titles she comes up with for blog posts.

This one about patterns, stucknesses and Shivanautical epiphanies was just terrific.

“I’ve just wrapped up one of the toughest weeks of my life. I don’t read my horoscope any more, but I’m sure it said something like gemini, your work life is going to be a giant ball of SUCK all week, so eat your Wheaties.”

Oh, and she also has a video post called What’s the metaphor, Kenneth. On wanting to work on them.

I don’t normally watch many videos. But she’s just so … her. And charming. And right there. LOVE. And if you have ideas for her metaphorizing, bring it on!

She’s @humanbeingblog on Twitter.

Item! The golden hour.

A lovely post from Briana about ritual, paying attention and making changes.

“Which makes it pretty clear why my old habit of opening my eyes and immediately peering into my blackberry to check for grenades was such a bad idea.

Bonjour anxiety! Wanna hang out with me today?
Maybe this information isn’t new, but receiving it through the right filter made a huge difference. Even though I knew it didn’t work for me to dive into the internet first thing, there was still too much check-check-checking. And then things would get all fuzzy and squonchy. Yes, squonchy.”

She’s @BrianaAldrich on Twitter.

Item! Let me google that for you.

You know when people ask you questions that can be easily answered by googling the thing? It’s Dear Lazy Web, but without even bothering to use the web.

So you google it for them because you’re too nice to say I don’t know, why don’t you google it?

Luckily, now you can send people to a site called let me google that for you.

It’s genius. Get this. You put your question into the googles, click the search button, press go and voila. It searches google for you.

Like, it types in the question for you, presses search for you and then asks, “There, was that so hard?”

If you don’t find this hysterically funny, I don’t know what to say.

It’s like a less complicated version of this. Or a less insulting version of this.

Found via the excellent @josephpred on Twitter. Thanks also to @jesscyn for cracking me up.

Item! I’m making a giant bubble wand.

And just as I decided that, bam! This showed up.

Also Hiro posted about bubbles and that was pretty perfect too.

Item! Update from the land of the Peculiar & Hilarious Shivanauts!

The “peculiar and hilarious” thing comes from Melynda’s sweet bit about Butterfly Wishes.

I taught a Shiva Nata class for Guns N Rollers (the Roller Derby team that I am obsessive about sponsor.

Secret Wacky Yoga Brain Training Ninja Wizardry ACTIVATE!

And of course we had the Dust off the DVD teleclass last week which was great fun.

Then I wrote about some more epiphanies I had.

And Rachael wrote a gorgeous post called the dance is the epiphany.

Basically it was a good week to be a Shivanaut. Spring is coming and we’re dancing out old patterns and dancing in new ones and it’s crazy and joyful and intense.

Item! Comments! Here’s what I want this time:

• Things you’re thinking about.
• Things to not do on my birthday.

My commitment.
I am committed to giving time and thought to the things that people say. Even though asking for what I want still feels awkward for me, I’m just going to remind myself that this is a thing I’m practicing.

That is all.

Happy reading.

And happy Blustery Windsday. Unless you’re Claire who gets a happy everything but no blustering. She likes it balmy. See you tomorrow.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Friday Chicken #64: pretty pretty princess edition
• Item! I expect you to be cursing in Cornish at my potluck
• Item! Pumpkin Head McMuffin Muffin?

Sometimes I have negotiators or moderators. Sometimes my monsters get cookies. Sometimes they don’t (not all monsters like cookies).

And it seemed appropriate to give some more information about the what, why and how of monsters, in case you want to talk to some of yours.

So. What is a monster?

A stuckness. A block. A wall.

Internal criticism. Old stuckified beliefs about what is true (like the outsider complex).

Anything you think to yourself (or about yourself) that hurts.

But why monsters? I don’t want monsters!

You don’t have to have monsters, sweetie. Of course not!

Jen talks about the Inner Critic. Hiro talks about pictures. Char calls them voices. Voices. Stories. Narrative.

Jo calls them Gremlins. One of my Kitchen Table mice has a flock of birds — the Flock of Stuck. Fi has her goblin (Mike). And, of course, Jung knew about the shadow.

These all work. Substitute whatever you like when I say “monster” — it’s okay by me.

The reason I go with monsters is this: as metaphors go, this one has all kinds of hugely powerful elements. Enough to make Metaphor Mouse proud. Because the monster metaphor is all about transformation.

Here’s what pretty much always happens.

When you’re working on a stuck or sitting with a hurt or working through the layers, you eventually discover that your stuck just wants to protect you.

Your monster means well. It’s just going about it all wrong

Your monster is small and vulnerable and fuzzy. And it just wants to know that you’ll be okay. And that’s why it makes itself so big and fierce — to scare you into letting it take care of you.

And once it knows that you know, it can turn into something else.

When we actually interact with our monsters (and recognize their intentions, while still letting them know that it is not okay to keep freaking us out like that), they change shape.

From big, bad wolves and scary, menacing shadow creatures … into pocket-sized playthings with enormous googly eyes.

From that sense of dread because ohmygod something horrible is Right Behind You … into Sulley from Monsters, Inc.*

* Best tagline ever: “We Scare Because We Care”.

From Max’s initial impression of the Wild Things roaring their terrible roars and gnashing their terrible teeth … to his realization that they can’t hurt him.

They’re just fuzzmuffin furball playmates, as vulnerable to loneliness and hurt as he is.

Talking your monsters is all about witnessing this transformation.

And really, being the one who initiates that transformation by showing up and being genuinely curious about the monster and your relationship with it.

We don’t kill monsters. Or hunt them. Or scare them.

We talk to them.

We let them know what we need to feel safe and supported and loved.

We find out what they need. Where their safety is.

We are curious about them. We are curious about ourselves.

I don’t mean to imply that they’re not scary. Because they are.

It’s super important to acknowledge the scariness of the scary (because encountering a monster really is terrifying).

And that has to happen before we can recognize whatever good intentions or old, out-of-date defense mechanisms might be behind the scary.

Eventually you might realize that whoah, your monster is a total sweetiepie fuzzball. Or that might never happen. Either way, we start with noticing how uncomfortable it is to be frightened.

That’s the starting point. Permission to be scared. And to ask for help. And to have other people stand up for you to negotiate and document the experience.

Would you like to meet some of my monsters?

Obviously you’ve already met my fear and my hurt and my anxious and my stuck.

But some of the physical representations of monsters who live in my house.

This is Diki.

Rawr.

He is a very menacing dragon.

And on the right he’s dressed as a pirate duck. Along with Selma who’s dressed as a pirate dragon. For Purim.

(Thanks, Elizabeth the Bee for surprising us with hand-made costumes! You rock!)

Schmooasaurus is below left. He is a super-schmoo.

That’s Miflatzon at bottom right. Pictured here with his girlfriend Sophie, who is French (and not a monster at all).

He is my little Monsterchen!

Please note him rocking the sovereignty crown, which was a present from Deborah.

It’s not that all monsters are as cute as these guys.

Certainly most of mine aren’t. *shudders*

When we’re in the scary, we’re really in it.

And so I don’t in any way mean to imply that the fear isn’t legitimate or that our perception of how mean they are is wrong.

Of course not.

Just that the more we actively learn about our monsters, the easier it is to recognize their hidden motivations. And their extreme fuzziness.

I keep the monsters I already know around so that I can remember how something that used to terrify me is now familiar.

So that I can remember how I used to believe my monsters when they said I wasn’t a writer. Or when they told me I would fail miserably.

I can remember how useful it was to discover that they were just trying to keep me from getting hurt. And what happened when I stopped being impressed by them.

Some of them went away. Or morphed into other things. And some of them became schnoogly friends who sit at my side while I write to you.

You do not have to like your monsters.

You do not have to become friends with your monsters.

You don’t have to be grateful for them or appreciate them or anything. Blech. Not required!

There are no shoulds in monster-watching.

You get to have negotiators and protectors. You get to have support and love. You get to have hand-holding when you want hand-holding and to be left alone when you want to be left alone.

The point of the watching isn’t to scare you. Or them.

The point of the watching is to find out what happens when you bring attention to your world and your experiences.

And maybe to be surprised.

Comment zen.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff.

We try to be patient while interacting with our stuff. We don’t throw shoes or give advice. And, of course, we give everyone’s monsters or non-monsters lots of room to be what they are.

*blows kisses at Commenter Mice and all the Beloved Lurkers*

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Speaking to the fog.
• The Negotiator, the Monster and the Scribe.
• Friday Chicken #83: Balkan Burrito Hangover

So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.

And now it’s my weekly ritual. Yay, ritual!

Let’s do it.

Thing 1: tiny little miracles

Here’s what I want:

Big forward progress on my Playground project.

And I want it to happen with ease.

I want the right pieces of information to fall into my lap this week.

Ways this could work:

You know? I’m not entirely sure.

It might not even matter.

A connection. A whisper. An introduction. A collaboration of minds.

It just could.

My commitment.

To keep eyes and ears open.

To activate my web of fabulous connections, as my friend Pam says.

To walk on it, sleep on it, dance on it, breathe on it, blow bubbles on it, eat nachos on it, dream on it, laugh on it.

To dance, dance, dance. And then to sit.

Thing 2: questions for my teleclass on Toozday.

Here’s what I want:

I’m teaching my once-a-year freebie class.

The theme is what to do when people throw shoes at us, when we throw shoes at ourselves, and when our definition of a shoe is totally different than someone else’s.

And I would much rather have a super interactive class based on questions from commenter mice than just teach.

But since we get crazy numbers of people on the call, I know a lot of people either won’t feel comfortable asking on the call or just might not get a chance.

So. A solution. Is needed.

Ways this could work:

Maybe we’ll set up a chat room for the call.

Maybe people will go to yesterday’s post and leave questions there (even if they want to leave them anonymously, which is fine).

Maybe a bunch of people will show up with questions.

But what I’d really like is to have a better sense of what my people want to know about so we can start there and take it deeper.

My commitment.

To have fun with this (well, that part is easy — these calls are pretty much always fun).

To appreciate each question for what it is, and try and extrapolate general usefulness that can help different people in a lot of different situations.

To keep a tough subject as lighthearted as possible, while still acknowledging the hard, and the fact that sometimes the hard really sucks.

Thing 3: transitional rituals (birthday rituals)

Here’s what I want:

My birthday is this weekend.

I want to invent some rituals.

Or borrow someone else’s.

It doesn’t really matter. The point is: I would like to spend my weekend marking transitions in meaningful and not-excessively-cheesy ways.

So this needs elements of safety. And reflection. And sovereignty. And goofiness. And wonder. And bubble-blowing. Oh, yes, there will be bubble-blowing.

Ways this could work:

I’m open to suggestions.

I’m also open to getting ideas through Shiva Nata, and having a Shivanautical epiphany or two come up.

And I could ask my Kitchen Table people for ideas.

Something could surprise me. But not a surprise party. Because that sounds hellish.

My commitment.

To not dismiss things too quickly.

To find out what I really want and work on letting that be a legitimate thing to want.

To be full of wonder at the marvel of being alive, here, now.

To blow lots of bubbles.

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.

Very interesting, let me tell you.

The first thing I asked for was knowing what the right compromise was.

And not only did I find what I was looking for, I also had a very strong realization this week that compromise was not the right thing.

But I did alter my plan pretty drastically in reaction to situations that came up. So it’s like I wanted A and couldn’t have A. But instead of compromising on A to get B which was kind of like A, I went in a different direction.

And now I’m headed towards Z, which is actually more like what I wanted with A than B could ever give me. But it’s not a compromise.

It’s new ground.

That might not make sense, but it makes sense in my head so bear with me.

The point: it’s interesting that the word ‘compromise’ showed up in a variety of different ways this week, and that I decided against it.

The second thing I asked for was movement and flow on my Playground project, and that is happening in a big way.

And then I asked for costumes, which was awesome because I ended up writing a whole post about it and getting the most genius ideas ever in the comments.

I wore a short skirt and a long jacket to the Bannister (my attorney), and pirate drag for Purim. It was great. Thank you!

Comments. Since I’m already asking …

I am adding to my practice of asking for stuff by being more specific about what I would like to receive in the comments.

Here’s what I want (just leave them in the comments):

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!

What I would rather not have:

• Reality theories.
• Shoulds. As in, “You should be doing it like this” or “That’s not the right way to ask for things — instead it should be like x, y and z”
• To be judged or psychoanalyzed.
• Advices.

My commitment.

I am committing to getting better at asking for things even when asking feels weird.

Thanks for doing this with me!

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Very Personal Ads #31: adjusting the crown
• Very Personal Ads #30: destuckifying by the ocean edition.
• Very Personal Ads #27: who’s coming to play?

Well, about destuckifying when those shoes are hurtling towards you.

And also about the relationship between shoe throwing and sovereignty.

If none of this is making sense …

Shoe-throwing = people saying hurtful things out of nowhere.

Sovereignty = the state of not giving a damn what people think … because you are the king or queen of your mental and emotional space.

Anyway.

Now we have a chance to talk about this some more.

About once a year Selma (my duck) and I teach one class that’s open to the public.

It’s called the Habits Detective call.

And here’s how it’s completely different from all of our other classes:

No charge. No prerequisites.

The subject/theme is always generally related to destuckification and rewriting patterns, but other than that … pretty much up for grabs.

And this time I thought it could be good to go a bit more in-depth into the whole shoe thing.

Stuff we might cover.

Oh, things like what to do when you get hit by what you perceive to be a giant shoe … but the other person involved doesn’t get that you’re in pain.

Or what to do when someone you love is convinced they’ve just had the biggest shoe ever thrown at them, but you’re positive that it wasn’t even slightly meant to be a shoe.

Dealing with criticism (external and/or internal).

Or anything else even slightly related to this that you want to talk about.

Things you should know about this call.

1. This is a teleclass which means it happens over the phone.

   If you’re not sure what I’m talking about, there’s a page on what a teleclass is and one on general protocol stuff.

2. You do have to sign up for it to get the phone number and access code.

   This is not to put you on a marketing list because that’s not my thing.

   Actually, I don’t even have one. Not having one is on my dammit list. Asking people to sign up helps my pirate crew track the interest level and make administrative pirate-ey decisions based on that information.*

   *Though if you’re wishing there were a “hey, Havi’s doing a thing” list, there is a small, private one that you can sign up for on the events page. I announce something maybe every few months.

3. The call is THIS TOOZDAY (that’s March 2nd, 2010) at 1pm Pacific.

   We usually go about an hour.

4. If you’ve signed up for the call, you will be sent a link to the recording, assuming the technology gods are on our side.
5. If you have a question you’d like to see covered in the call, go ahead and leave it in the comments section of this post. Thanks!
6. The purpose of class is not to pitch stuff. I won’t be mentioning products or programs that I do. It’s for us. To hang out and learn together.
7. We usually get a few hundred (smart, interesting, sweet, goofball) people signing up for these. Fun!

That’s it!

Uh huh.

Shoes! And what to do about them.

Class is THIS TOOZDAY.

You can sign up for it here and that will give you a. access to the call and b. a link to the recording when it’s up (within a day or two of the call).**

** Note: Anyone who emails my pirate crew asking if there will be a recording or when it’s going to be up will probably have to walk the plank.

And again, if you have questions for the call or stuff you want to make sure we cover, leave it here in the comments so I know where to find it.

Monday we’ll have the weekly Very Personal Ad, and then, who knows, maybe I’ll get to talk to you on Toozday. Yay! Looking forward.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Ask Havi #30: preparing for criticism (and hurled shoes)
• The Glossary! It makes your hair all shiny.
• You know what I’m terrible at?

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

The hard stuff

The Day of Five Meetings.

Brain fog.

Each one was full of good. And all together they kind of did me in.

The too-muchness of the too-much was … well, if you must know, a bit much.

Crying at the Bannister’s office.

The Bannister is what I’m calling my attorney.

Don’t ask. He’s lovely. And I also burst into tears during our meeting, which was not even slightly his fault. And also surprising and not fun.

An uncomfortable disagreement.

My gentleman friend and I don’t have much we disagree on.

David Bowie. The music, not the man, yes? My gentleman friend approves more than I deem reasonable.

The rest of the 70s. Well, the hideous aesthetic home interior stylings of the rest of the 70s. I approve more than he deems reasonable.

And that’s about it.

As long as he’s not playing Starshine Ziggy Diamond Hunky Dory Dogs Something Something and I’m not trying to paint our refrigerator harvest gold, things are good.

And this week we had a huge disagreement. Which we then sorted out and now all is good.

It was still really hard while it was happening though.

Yet again I thank Jonathan Scheff for introducing me to nonviolent communication, and I apologize for not immediately appreciating its usefulness.

I saw High Plains Drifter.

Well, I saw a chunk of it. Not much. But still.

Way more than I would have liked to.

Ugh. Horribleness. Ugh. Terror. Ugh everything.

In general, I will pretty much always watch a western.*

* Yes, I don’t mind violence if it’s stylized ass-kicking or flamboyant shoot-outs. It’s cruelty and abuse I can’t watch.

Anyway. Ruined my night and most of the next day while I was clearing a lot of gunk out of my world.

Is it still February?

Yeesh.

I’m mostly over the February Cranky, but I’d swear this month was at least ten weeks long.

The good stuff

Lots and lots of Fairy Godmothers.

I got help from Pam and Hiro and Cairene with my Playground project and they all did wonders.

Feeling so relieved to be making progress on this.

Met with the Bannister.

I have a new Bannister.

Steps can be taken! Hooray!

Short blog posts!

Remember when I just could not write anything under fifteen hundred words?

And then I couldn’t get under a thousand?

Because my brain would explode it took twice as long to write short posts?

Ha! I’ve been managing to write 700 word posts and not hurt my head in the process. Huzzah.

Costumes.

I like them.

Pirate boots making everything better this week.

An enormous Shivanautical epiphany.

Haven’t written about this one but it is a big one.

Yay Shiva Nata for making my life ridiculously interesting. And for coming up with perfect, simple solutions in perfect timing for pretty much whatever I’m working on.

Hamentaschen!

Spent most of yesterday baking and oh they are lovely.

I can’t eat them of course because of the sugar but I can look at how pretty they are and listen to the admiring oohs from the people who can.

Totally counts.

My work.

Selma and I taught a bunch of teleclasses this week, all of which were … just fun. Pleasurable.

My people are lovely.

And had some delightful sessions with clients.

And it’s good. Sometimes I forget to stop and breathe and say oh yes I like this thing.

So. Yeah. I like this thing.

And … playing live at the meme beach house!

Yes, that’s a Stuism too.

My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”

This week it’s a British band.

Venn and the Diagrammes.

It’s weird, though, because it’s really just one guy.

Thanks, Walt for giving me this one.

No Stuisms this week. I do believe I may have kicked the habit for a while. We’ll see.

That’s it for me …

And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.

Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?

And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Friday Chicken #83: Balkan Burrito Hangover
• Costumes.
• Friday Check-in #32: “take that!” edition